Watch out NBA, Duke just might apply for membership

Duke’s mugging of otherwise respectable Seton Hall the other night was one of those “wows”, Duke leading something like 33-5 before Coach K started subbing heavy and letting The Pirates claw their way back to a somewhat respectable, what, 30-some point loss instead of what could have easily been a 40 or 50 point one?

Duke’s good, VERY good, they were ranked #1 in all the pre-season polls but damn, folks, they could have beaten The NBA’s Lakers the other night, Wow.

Just don’t bet the farm on the first Duke-Carolina game.

Even though UNC is first defending national champion team not to be even ranked in the pre-season polls, ever, as any native knows when it comes to the Duke-Carolina game, all bets are off, all depth charts are off, all everything else is off except a knife fight in a telephone booth mentality on the parts of both respective squads.

Will the Dookies go undefeated this year? Nah, no way, there’s simply too much parody, well, I meant to actually say “parity” but “parody” works almost as well, in men’s college basketball for Duke to run the table, and it will be a mouse of a team who has 2-3 hot hands dropping 3-point shots and playing silly-great defense that will beat them, not an elephant of a team whom they match up more or less closer against.

But it finally is ACC basketball season and it will be a great, great season, even with the expansion of the league to 12 teams which will not dillutting the strength of the conference will make the games and the usual outcomes a little to a lot more unpredictable, more schizophrenic to say the least.

My dark horse pick this season: The Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets . . . outmanned and outclassed by all but 2-3 of the ACC teams, they simply have the hottest and best X’s-and-O’s coach in Paul Hewitt and The Jackets will definitely pull a couple of world-class upsets this season, watch out for them.